Family Pictures by Jane Green
Eve stares at the chocolate chip cookies. They are the ones she used to love. The soft, chewy kind. Buttery, moist, these were the ones her mom would always keep in the pantry, the ones Eve would steal when no one was looking. She can’t take her eyes off them, imagines biting into them, feeling the familiar sweetness on her tongue, the sweetness of her childhood. Everything around her fades as she stares at the cookies, wanting to cry.
Her stomach growls. She is so hungry. She has eaten two egg whites today. This is her latest decision. She read somewhere that a singer, whose weight famously went up and down, lost by eating only egg whites. The singer would eat twenty at a time, but Eve feels more in control when she is challenging herself by eating as little as possible. Two egg whites felt like too many. Tomorrow she is planning to have one.
But those cookies are overpowering. Unable to stop herself, she stands, walking over to the food.
“I’m just going to clean up a bit,” she says, knowing they will tease her, for she has always been a control freak.
“Don’t!” Claudia says. “You’re crazy! Leave it. We’ll all do it later.”
“You know me.” Eve smiles. “Nothing gives me more pleasure than cleaning.” Claudia laughs, shaking her head with incomprehension as Eve picks up the spilled popcorn bag and cookies.
No one watches, no one is paying attention as Eve heads inside, her heart pounding, standing at the kitchen counter so she can check no one comes in, no one can see.
She eats the first cookie, savoring it, closing her eyes, unable to believe she has refrained from sugar, from anything this good for such a long time. The second, then third, are barely chewed before being swallowed. Eve eats as if she is starving—which, of course, she is.
Seconds later, she stares at the empty container, moving quickly to bury it at the bottom of the trash can, piling newspapers on top of it to hide it. Without thinking, she moves silently into the pantry, pulling down packets of cookies, snack bars, consuming them without thought or taste, gulping them down until her stomach starts to hurt.
She steps back, horrified, racing to the kitchen to find trash bags to hide the detritus of this sudden binge, filled with shame and self-loathing.
There isn’t any question as to what she should do now. The disgust she feels is too much to bear, and there is only one way to get rid of it, and get rid of it she must.
Once the trash bag is filled, Eve takes it outside, pushes it to the bottom of the can, then locks herself in the bathroom, kneeling by the tub. She hasn’t ever done this before, but she knows what to do.
She puts her finger in her mouth, reaching for the back of her throat, gagging only slightly. She tries again, panicking, for this food must come out, she doesn’t know what she will do if she cannot purge this food out of her body.
She tries again, going deeper, scratching the back of her throat, using her other hand to massage her stomach as she thinks of the sugar and fat coating her insides, and then, suddenly, her stomach spasms as a wave of chocolate and sugar comes up, followed by another, and another.
Her finger goes down her throat twice more, until she is absolutely sure there is nothing left; then she lays her head on the toilet seat in exhausted relief. Please God, she thinks, don’t let me do that again. The food she ate tonight was disgusting, but at least it’s out of her body. She will never do that again, never eat so much she has to make herself vomit. Tomorrow, as punishment, she will drink lemon water all day. Not even one egg white. Nothing.
Tomorrow she will get right back on track.
6
Sylvie
Sylvie has spent the afternoon making date and pecan meringues, a favorite of both Mark’s and Eve’s. She bakes when she is happy, is hopeful this will tempt Eve to actually eat, for who could not be tempted after walking in the door and being hit with the smell of cinnamon, vanilla, and sugar.
The text comes in just before two thirty. “I’m going to Jenna’s house. I might sleepover.”
“Papa’s home tonight,” Sylvie, disappointed, texts back immediately. “You need to be home.”
“Why? I’ll see him all weekend.”
It’s true. Sylvie keeps thinking of her as a little girl, picturing them all having a wonderful evening together, Mark and Eve then spending hours playing their beloved Ping-Pong in the garden, but those days are gone. Now Eve would sit there picking at the food, pretending to have eaten earlier. She’d be sulky and difficult because her friends would be doing something else. Mark would challenge her to Ping-Pong, and Eve would either refuse, or play badly, refuse to enter into the spirit of the game, and the evening would doubtless end in a huge fight.
Maybe she and Mark should have a date night tonight, something they haven’t done for so long. When he is here, they are so often invited to things—neighborhood barbecues, informal get-togethers, and when he is away, Sylvie has a tendency to hibernate in the house.
“Fine,” she texts back to Eve. “Do you want me to drop anything off?”
“Yes! Can I have my white lacy top and blue leggings? And my makeup bag? And flat iron? TY!!!”
“love you,” Sylvie writes.
“u 2” comes back as Sylvie reaches out and takes a meringue. Then another. And another.
She knows, of course, that Eve’s lack of interest in her mother, so recent and so painful, is part of the separation process. She knows it is entirely normal. It is the subject of all the conversations the mothers at school seem to be having nowadays.
Which doesn’t make it any less painful.
Sylvie may be many things: wife, cook, dog-walker, bookseller, friend, confidante, artist, volunteer, but first on the list, the one that is most important to her, is mother.
With Eve going … going … not quite yet gone, being alone is no longer something she looks forward to. She craves conversation. She craves some kind of outlet. Not company so much as … something. An outlet.
And she may have found the perfect thing.
* * *
Sylvie is lounging in a bubble bath when she hears Mark’s car in the driveway.
She climbs out quickly, whips the plastic cap off her head, pulls a terry-cloth robe on, and pads down the hallway to greet him.
Even after all these years, she is still excited to see him. Perhaps this is the beauty of a part-time marriage: You never grow bored of each other; being apart so often gives you time to miss each other, to appreciate each other in a way you can’t when your life is just pots and pans.
Mark is walking up the stairs as she reaches the top, both of them grinning as Mark sweeps her up to plant a long, soft kiss on her lips.
“I have really missed you,” he murmurs, edging their bedroom door open and laying her gently on the bed as her arms snake up around his neck.
“I like when you miss me so much, you come home early,” Sylvie purrs. “This is the loveliest surprise ever.” She shivers as he swirls his tongue in her ear, his hands already busy moving her robe aside, tracing lightly down her abdomen.
“You smell so good,” he murmurs, inhaling deeply as his fingers finally reach their goal, smiling as he raises his head to look deep in her eyes. “I love you,” he says quietly, gazing at her.
“I love you.” She flickers her eyes closed as the sensations start to build, a brief moan escaping her lips, opening her eyes and laughing at the intensity of Mark’s gaze, the love and commitment she sees there.
Flipping over, she straddles him, sliding her tongue into his mouth, grinding against his hardness as she reaches down to undo his pants. She kisses down his chest, his stomach, pulling his zipper down with her teeth, laughing softly as he moans in anticipation, taking him in her mouth and savoring his feel, his taste, his smell, the sounds of pleasure he makes as he gasps.
Afterwards, she curls into Mark’s side, wondering how she could ever have questioned his loyalty, his fidelity. Their bodies fit together perfectly, his strong hand tracing up and down on her back as he turns his head from time to time t
“I don’t know what I did to deserve you,” Mark says, as he so often does, turning to look at her. “You are the most precious thing in the world to me, and I am the luckiest man in the world.”
“No, I am the luckiest girl in the world,” Sylvie responds, as she always responds, even though she knows that if it is true, as Angie always says, that in every relationship there was the Lover, and the Loved, with Mark she is the Loved.
“So what is this great idea you wanted to talk to me about? It’s not … Tupperware, is it?”
Sylvie laughs. “No. Nor is it skin care.” Over the past year, she fields at least one invitation a week to attend a house party where mothers she knows from school have transformed themselves into saleswomen, extolling the life-changing benefits of a skin-care line, or jewelry, or children’s clothes from a catalog.
She feels guilty if she doesn’t buy—has a bathroom cabinet filled with vitality pills that she is determined to one day try, jewelry that she never liked languishes in a drawer. She has now learned to decline the invitations.
Sylvie does not want to be one of those women. She has stacks of things she has made over the years, but is far too embarrassed to sell them. When she has received compliments, and requests for pots she has thrown, scarves she has painted, or jewelry she has beaded, she will simply take it off and insist they have it, much to Angie’s disgust.
Angie has offered to host a sale of Sylvie’s things herself, but Sylvie refuses. She isn’t sure what her resistance is, other than perhaps this ridiculous notion her mother has always lived by, that a woman’s role is to support her husband by looking after him, not by going out to work. Her part-time job in a bookstore was fine, Clothilde said. It wasn’t a proper job, just a flight of fancy, a nothing of a job.
Before the accident left her brain-damaged—moderate, but nevertheless brain-damaged—confused, disorganized, depressed in a way she had not been before, Sylvie’s mother was the quintessential Frenchwoman. Effortlessly elegant, flirtatious, charming, and coy, she knew how to wrap men around her little finger.
But there was another side to her, that only those closest saw. With her family she was sweet and loving one minute, then violently angry and critical the next. Sylvie never knew where she stood, tiptoed around her, terrified that last hug, that smothering of kisses was just about to turn into a rage-filled diatribe.
Clothilde’s wrath, her volatility, would snake around corners, slip under closed doors, shriek for Sylvie until she nervously tiptoed downstairs, backing against the wall as her mother ranted and raged over something that had nothing to do with Sylvie.
If she was lucky, her father would be home, would take her out for ice cream. By the time they returned, Clothilde would invariably be sweet and sunny, racked with guilt at her behavior, would cover Sylvie in kisses and leave her unable to trust anything at all.
Even today, despite all the evidence, she harbors an irrational hope that her mother will change. Even today, despite having a child, a husband, a grown-up life of her own, Sylvie is still scared by her mother’s volatility; her mother has more influence on her than Sylvie would ever care to admit.
Sylvie went to art school in spite of Clothilde. She got her first job as a textile designer in spite of Clothilde, and learned to avoid her mother in order to escape the criticism, for she loved her work back then.
Now, as much as she wants to work to alleviate her growing discontent, Sylvie also wants to work for the challenge, to have money of her own. Not because Mark denies her, exactly—she has access to their household account—but each time she reaches for the credit card for anything other than a necessity—a hat, some gold wire to make earrings, chocolate leather boots that she doesn’t really need, but oh, they are so very lovely—she pauses to think about what Mark will say, and usually ends up leaving them behind.
Mark assures her they are fine financially, but he has a plan to retire in five years, and they have to watch every penny. If they don’t absolutely need it, he says, leave it. She has learned to be frugal, and she longs to have money of her own again, to be able to buy those boots without thinking, or those beads, or that top.
Five years, and Mark will be home. With her. Not just her husband, but her partner as well. As hard as it is not having him here, knowing they have a goal to work toward is something she can try to live with.
Sylvie props herself up on an elbow and looks at Mark, curling his chest hair round her fingers. “I’ve been thinking about candles.”
“Candles?”
“It’s a bit of a long story, but yes. I think I’d quite like to make candles.”
Mark scoots back to make himself comfortable on the pillows, holding an arm out for Sylvie to nestle in. “We have all the time in the world. Tell me all.”
* * *
Sylvie will do almost anything she can to avoid visiting her mother, apart from on Wednesday afternoons, when the assisted living facility brings in an arts-and-crafts teacher to do a project with the inhabitants and their guests.
Clothilde is always there, always participating, always criticizing the teacher, the method, the point. She criticizes loudly and well within everyone’s earshot, as Sylvie squirms in discomfort, determining not to come back; week after week, Sylvie is there.
She finds it almost meditative, to lose herself in a creative activity. Whether it’s spiraling coil pots out of terra-cotta clay, beading simple necklaces on a wire, or fashioning papier-mâché vases from newspapers and balloons, Sylvie finds the class not only calming, but also inspirational.
However basic the projects may be, the classes are stirring her creativity, Sylvie going on to produce items at home she then gives away to friends.
Last week was candles. Not candle-making, for that would be too difficult and too dangerous for the elderly occupants of the home, but candle-wrapping: taking a pillar candle, measuring a sheet of beeswax to fit precisely around the outside, cutting to size, wrapping the wax, then securing with a raffia tie.
It was mindless, and would have been disappointing, had Sylvie not engaged the teacher in a fascinating discussion about candle-making. Sylvie learned about the benefits of organic soy wax retaining the scent of the oils, the importance of using natural wicks so lead wasn’t released into the air; she learned about melting temperatures, and pouring temperatures, and additives to harden.
She learned that some waxes hold fragrance far better than others, that most candles require two pours, as the first invariably brings bubbles and imperfections up to the surface. She learned that the reason her mother’s candles, expensive though they were, invariably ended up with a tunnel around the wick, the rest of the candle staying intact, was because she didn’t burn them long enough the first time they were lit in order to create a good melting pool.
At home she went straight to her computer, filled with an urge to make candles herself. Her mother’s insistence on new Diptyque candles every couple of weeks were costing her a fortune—imagine if she were able to re-create the scent, or even create something entirely new, that her mother would love, and make them for a fraction of the cost.
Her mother loved fig. That she knew. But fig on its own? Surely she would need something else. Sylvie started looking at other fig candles, noting what other fragrances they used. Amber. Jasmine. Gardenia. Chypre. Chypre? What on earth was chypre? A combination of sensual, earthy base notes, she read. Base notes. Ah. Perfume. That’s what she should be researching.
The more she read, the more she began to see it, feel it, the calmer and more centered she became. It was like coming home to herself. What if she were to produce a line of organic candles at home? What if this could be exactly what she is looking for?
* * *
Mark, as pragmatic and practical as he is loving, asks her all the questions she cannot answer.
Cost, margins, sales information, and finally, has she actually tried this before?
“Of course not,” laughs Sylvie. “Hello? This is y
“That’s true. Just don’t spend a fortune without figuring out the costs involved. I’ll help you. I have spreadsheets designed exactly for this. So”—his hand is once again moving down her body—“what’s the plan for tonight?”
“I have a reservation at George’s. I thought we could have a date night.”
“Deck or inside?”
“Deck!” She grins. “Told you it’s useful having friends in high places.”
“If you’d have said inside, I might have tried to convince you to stay in bed, but”—he shrugs—“I can’t resist the view. But”—he rolls on top of her—“there’s something I just have to do first.”
“Not now.” Sylvie pushes him away with another grin. “I have to get ready. Promise I’ll make it up to you later, though.”
Sylvie gets out of bed and walks naked to the bathroom, wiggling her bottom deliberately, still grinning over her shoulder at him as she walks, blowing him a kiss as she closes the bathroom door.
7
Sylvie
Eleven years, and the chemistry between them is just as strong as, if not stronger than, it ever was. This, perhaps more than anything else, has been the force that has kept them close. On girls’ nights out, when Angie, friends, drink too much, they confess to low libidos, tricks to avoid having sex with their husbands; they refer to making love with much eye-rolling and sighing, everyone laughing as if they all understand, they all feel exactly the same way.
Sylvie doesn’t laugh. She doesn’t know if these women were once attracted to their husbands, only to have children, work, school runs, cleaning, cooking, dog-walking, driving, life, grind away at that attraction until they wake up one morning to find that attraction has entirely disappeared.
Perhaps they never had it. There were certainly a couple of women she knew who organized business mergers rather than a marriage. Their husbands were never home; in return, they got all the material possessions they wanted. They spoke of their husbands with disdain and disappointment. The fortnightly sex was their payment in kind: a payment that was treated as a necessary but wearying obligation.